Tales of True Love
by Kuneko
Summary: Claire's the new girl in town, and there are five lovely ladies on her radar – which of them will prove to be a kindred spirit? A drabble series in honour of the inclusive LGBT hack "Harvest Moon: True Love Edition" – Google it!
1. Mary

**/Author's Note: **The HM fandom is often quite awesome, and one member of the fandom put together a hack of the Harvest Moon GBA games to allow you to play as the opposite gender and woo same-sex bachelor(ette)s! I'm sure I don't need to explain why this is important and awesome and should be adopted into actual HM games. The hack got me thinking of the Mineral Town bachelorettes, their mindsets and dynamics, and how they might act in such a situation, so I got to writing! These are short drabbles, ultimately, but hopefully they'll offer some insight into the minds of our lovely Mineral Town ladies! **End Author's Note/  
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><p><strong>Tales of True Love<strong>

…_Mary…_

_The fledgling farmer struggled to take a step without tripping over the debris littering the once-thriving fields. He_

The pen stopped, leaving a smear of bled ink. Mary lifted it to her forehead, scratched the skin underneath her ebony bangs, and blinked at the ink-assaulted page. Something was off. _Something._

The door of the Mineral Town Library swung open, pulling her unceremoniously from the world of her writing. She snapped the notebook shut instinctively, and looked up to greet the patron – only to realize that she was face-to-face with a stranger.

"Hi there! I'm Claire." Her hair was blonde and straggly, her eyes popping with fervor, and her outstretched hand muddied and rough. Mary shook it and tried for a 'nice to meet you' before instantly tumbling over her words. If she could speak as well as she could _write…_

"Oh, don't get your hopes up: I'm not much of a reader." Claire laughed unabashedly, "I was just making the rounds, introducing myself. I'm the new farm owner."

It took a few seconds for the words to register. Mary had expected a –

"Boy, it sure is hot today." Claire pulled at the collar of her severely outdated flannel shirt, revealing glistening lines of sweat along her collarbone. "I'm too delicate a flower to be out and about in the sun like this," she winked, obviously not believing a word of it. "There's no guarantee I'll remember this place exists – again, not much of a reader – but feel free to stop by the farm sometime! I, um, didn't actually get your name…"

"Oh… M-Mary." Said the librarian.

"Then, see you around Mary!"

She left, leaving a lingering smell of dirt and sweat and livestock in her wake. And a lingering streak of red on the face of the librarian.

Opening up her notebook again, Mary sat down and began to edit. There was a simple change she had decided to make; immediately the words flowed from her pen ceaselessly.

__The fledgling farmer struggled to take a step without tripping over the debris littering the once-thriving fields._ __**She **__was ready to start a brand new chapter of her life. _


	2. Karen

**Tales of True Love**

…_Karen…_

"Bacardi?"

"No."

"Mm… Cosmos!"

"_No, _Karen."

"Amaretto Sour?"

"_No!_"

Karen panicked. She was nearly out of beverages to name – and she'd soon have to face the fact that, just maybe, the blonde newcomer, as per her insistent claims, might _not actually like to drink. _

But that made _no _sense – not to the teenager's alcohol-addled senses, anyway.

"Okay, so you're not a drinker, but what vices _do _you have? And don't say 'none', or I _will_ hose you down." Karen stretched out, sprawling her bare arms on the glossy finish of Doug's countertop. The blonde farmer occupied the barstool next to her, picking at a plate of chicken tenders and making no effort to hide the regret she felt at having chosen this spot.

"Um, what?"

"Because… You know, because yer pants would be on fire. Like a liar. So I'd hafta get the hose to put 'em out."

"What can I say," Claire dropped her fork in irritation, "I'm… straight-laced! I'm uptight! I'm puritanical! I'm – I'm –"

"Boring?" burped Karen helpfully.

"Doug, I think I'll have the bill now," Claire huffed, sending the ends of her blonde fringe flittering upwards.

"You shouldn't be so nosy, Karen," Rick, the boyfriend, reprimanded her later that night, after Claire had abandoned her half-eaten meal and left the bar in a huff.

"It – It just doesn't make seeeeeense!" Karen spun around on her barstool, imagining dramatic rotating cameras filming the soap opera that was her life. "How can someone so – so _hot _be so _boring_? I need – _I need to know!" _Her eyes spun wildly. "I need all her secrets! I _will _have them!"

There was only so much a boyfriend could do when his girlfriend began declaring her intents towards a strikingly attractive blonde.

"That's enough for tonight, Karen. C'mon, I'm cutting you off." He lunged for the bottle in front of her.

"What?! Rick? _Noooooo!_"


	3. Elli

**Tales of True Love**

…_Elli…_

"You're going to make a wonderful mother one day," a woman had crooned as Elli handed her her newborn child, following a successful birthing.

…

"You're working overtime _again_?" The Doctor had sounded almost concerned, but immediately found a way to tease his nurse: "Tut tut, how are you going to face your poor, lonely husband? Sitting at home, wondering where his wife is…"

…

"You know, Elli, darling: it was around your age that your mother settled down…" Grandma Ellen had never been great at subtly.

…

The various comments swam circles around Elli's head, fueling a frustrated sigh from the nurse-but-actually-just-a-receptionist. Pickings were slim around Mineral Town: men were either already taken or so intensely focused on their objects of affections that they straddled the fence precariously between 'secret admirer' and 'stalker'. And none of those men had their eyes set on Elli – the girl who had once, as a little brunette, made the outrageous claim that she'd be married by the time she was twelve and have fifty-three babies. She was letting her five-year-old-self down, the way she was going.

All it took was one compliment from an addle-brained farmer - rubbing a freshly-nursed head injury that came about from tripping over a cucumber vine – to send everything she thought she wanted into question.

"You're an amazing nurse. You could be running this whole place, y'know."

Damn straight_, _Elli thought, except Elli didn't swear. _Darn _straight.

"I'm nothing compared to the Doctor," Elli's self-effacing answer came out with almost no resistance – it was almost rehearsed. "I'm lucky to be learning under him."

"Whatever! This Doctor fella, - does he even have a name? –" (Elli shook her head, no.) "- Should feel lucky to be working with such a talented lady."

Elli smiled, her heart fluttering.

"I'm Claire, by the way," the blonde stretched out her hand and Elli shook it. "Thanks for the help. Let's get a coffee sometime, yeah?"

Elli hated coffee.

"Oh… Sure! I'd like that very much."


	4. Popuri

**Tales of True Love**

…_Popuri…_

Popuri had daddy issues. And brother issues. And boyfriend issues. Popuri did _not_ do well with boys. Popuri's father left them when she was still, like, super young. Popuri's brother was, like, _so _bossy and rude and cocky. And Popuri's boyfriend? Ugh, he was _way _too self-involved, and hey, how did she know he wasn't hooking up with other girls for the three quarters of the year that he wasn't in Mineral Town? And, like, don't even get her started on the way her brother and her boyfriend _fought _over her, it was like Kai spent more time trying to get Rick riled up than he did caring for her… Ohmigosh, what if there was like, unresolved sexual tension between the two? Popuri _swore _she had read about that in some magazine or another.

Claire had learned all of this in the first fifteen minutes she had spent with the girl with bubblegum for hair. Popuri was very… _open. _And when she had found out that she had a new neighbor – a new _female _neighbor – she had already decided they would be bestest friends. This decision had something to do with her other best friend wasting away her life in a wine bottle, or something like that.

"That sounds… rough?" offered the farmer, unsure how to approach the freely-bared soul in front of her. Popuri nodded vigorously, pounding a fist on the fence they were sitting on.

"Right?! So what about you? What's your boyfriend like?"

"I'm not really dating anyone right now."

"Really? I guess that makes sense! You're looking for, like, a blank slate, right? Tabouli Rasa!"

Claire resisted correcting her. "Yeah, something like that."

"Then I bet you've got some _awful _ex-boyfriend stories to share." She was almost giddy at the prospect.

"Well, not so much ex-_boy_friends, but…"

"Ooooh, you've gotta fill me in! At our first sleepover party! Oooh, I can't wait. My house or yours?"

"Wait, what?"

"Ohmigosh, I'm being like, a crazy creeper right now, aren't I?"

"No, no, it's just—"

"It's okay! Like, ugh, _boundaries, _right? Yeah, Kai's always telling me about those things. I'm sorry, I'm working on that."

Claire spent the next three minutes fervently assuring Popuri that she was _not, _in fact, a 'psycho-clingy-stalker-girlfriend'. Once Popuri had calmed down – it did happen, eventually - she stretched, hopped off the fence, and said:

"Now how 'bout we take a bath? You've _got _to try the hot springs on Mother Hill. C'mon!"


	5. Ann

**Tales of True Love**

…_Ann…_

A sonorous belch escaped Ann's mouth. This was followed by a smatter of laughter, snorts, and hiccups.

Claire had never been drunk in her life of piety, but if she had to imagine it, she imagined it would feel very much so like being with Ann. It was after hours and the patrons of Doug's Place had hobbled on home (and Karen had been tucked away gently in one of the inn's rooms, after drinking enough to fall asleep at the bar counter), leaving Ann to her least favourite chore: the post-closing clean up.

Claire had offered to stay and help out, and Ann had jumped on the opportunity, even if it meant that she was now awake two hours later than she usually was, after an upbeat evening spent trading life stories and corny jokes, dancing to old 70s music that Ann promised was the most contemporary music to hit Mineral Town, and helping themselves to a milkshake or four. And very little cleaning.

"I shouldn't be giving these out for free, y'know…" Ann gave a lopsided grin as her mouth suckled at her straw, loud slurping sounds resonating from the bottom of her nearly-emptied glass.

"Free? This is compensation, my good lady, for all the work I've put in tonight!" The two swiveled on their bar stools and eyed the forgotten broomstick, duster, and other assorted cleaning supplies. Then they burst into laughter, again.

A bond was forming, and Claire could guess why: Ann was a girl who didn't care that she was a girl, and Ann was a girl who didn't care that Claire was a girl. Gender was as important to Ann as, maybe, shoe size - and this meant that she didn't do a double-take when Claire told her she was the new farmer in town; it meant she didn't give a second glance to the muddy, broken-down sneakers that she walked in with; it meant she didn't bat an eyelid when Claire confided in her – the first person in her new town that she was able to – that she had a preference for the fairer sex.

"I mean, it's like, it's hard enough to find just one personwho's good enough, right? Good luck with _that,_" she said in response to the farmer revealing this particularly vulnerable part of herself, "So why limit ourselves to only one half of the planet's population, yeah? I think about that a lot. Aren't we just cutting our chances down by half? Or somethin' like that – I never was good at math, Dad takes care of all the finances – but, yeah, it never made sense to me. We shouldn't have to feel bad for where we look for love."

For a heartbeat after Ann had finished speaking, Claire had wanted to kiss her. Then her stomach emitted the tiniest of growls, and she realized all she wanted to do with the girl was drink more milkshakes. Maybe until the sun came up on the dusty, unswept, disheveled inn.

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><p><strong>Author's Note: **Thanks for reading! Let me know which one was your favourite, or any other feedback you might have! **End Author's Note/**


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